Cambridge Business Association
Cloud Surfing
Book

Cloud Surfing

A New Way to Think About Risk, Innovation, Scale, and Success

Thomas M. Koulopoulos
Bibliomotion, 2012
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8

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Recommendation

The ancient Greek mathematician Pythagoras once said, “Above the cloud with its shadow is the star with its light,” an appropriate metaphor for coming to grips with the field of cloud computing, a confusing topic for many business professionals. Even management consultant Thomas M. Koulopoulos, an expert, spends his manual’s first 25 pages defining the cloud. He cautions readers that the cloud is neither synonymous with the Internet nor an offsite data center where you stash pictures and documents. getAbstract recommends his admirable explanation of how the “hyperconnectivity” of the cloud will influence how people work, play, learn, innovate and socialize in the near future. This guidebook will offer you clear, starry skies to help you navigate the cloud.

Summary

Complete Connectivity

The world is “hyperconnected.” Social media, email and communications technology have raised person-to-person connections to a previously unimagined high. The technological links between machines and humans create a complex weave of great reach and magnitude. Geography and the proprietary behavior of high-tech companies have localized each separate strand of this interlaced fabric.

To many, the concept that their actions and communications, including details of their personal history, are easily accessible is terrifying. However, mass hyperconnectivity also creates tremendous opportunities, especially if progress mitigates or eliminates the downside risks.

The “Internet” and the “cloud” are not interchangeable terms. The cloud uses the Internet to connect people, but it also uses other connective mobile and satellite technology. While only in its “adolescent” stage of development now, the cloud is an “amalgam” of software and hardware, “an evolving, intelligent, infinitely scalable, always available, real-time collection of technology, content and human resources that can be accessed as and when needed” in these ways:

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About the Author

Management consultant Thomas M. Koulopoulos founded the Delphi Group and writes about high tech and data. He also wrote The X-Economy and Smartsourcing.

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    M. C. 3 years ago
    Enjoyable summary. There is so much that can be done and solved with the cloud. More and more people need to know 'how to cloud'. It is a tech skill that will never perish.
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    P. L. 1 decade ago
    Nice.
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    P. B. getAbstract 1 decade ago
    It's exciting and clear: whoever has not yet embraced cloud based services should do so quickly! Interesting summary.